PORT ST. LUCIE — Mayor Greg Oravec made Reggie Osenton his top pick for city attorney, negotiated Osenton's contract and provided regular feedback on Osenton's performance, including a strongly worded annual review.

But Oravec deflected any blame for himself or other City Council members while overseeing Osenton, who was pressured to resign suddenly Feb. 22 in the wake of an internal investigation which found he violated city hiring policy and presided over a dysfunctional staff.

It was the third time in four years a city attorney has left under a cloud and the second time during Oravec's three-year tenure as mayor. Under the city charter, the council appoints the city attorney, who serves at the council's pleasure.

Blame Osenton

Oravec placed all the blame for the recent breakdown in the City Attorney's Office squarely on Osenton.

"The City Council does not engage in the day-to-day management of the city attorney or any employees," Oravec wrote in an email response to TCPalm's questions about who was at fault. "The city attorney is responsible for managing the City Attorney's Office and all its employees.

Port St. Lucie City Council watch presentation during Feb. 26, 2018 meeting.(Photo: GEORGE ANDREASSI/TCPALM)

"What we can and will continue to do is learn from our experience, get better as a result and do everything we can to move our community forward," Oravec wrote.

But Oravec did not say what went wrong, what lessons council members learned from the debacle, what they could have done differently or what steps they would take to better oversee the City Attorney's Office in the future.

Council members communicated regularly with Osenton during his 17 months as city attorney.

Four council members gave Osenton passing grades on his annual review in November, while Oravec's evaluation called Osenton's customer service and performance at council meetings poor.

Investigation findings

The city's internal investigation of the City Attorney's Office found Osenton violated hiring policy by listing the word "attractive" among the 10 qualities he was seeking in staff-attorney candidates. The investigation also revealed a staff generally divided between veteran female employees and new male employees hired by Osenton.

Osenton took responsibility for his policy violation, telling TCPalm it was "my mistake."

He said he first developed the list of 10 qualities many years ago while he was in private practice and never updated it.

“As far as the word ‘attractive’ on that form, it was stupid of me to use the form that had that word on it,” Osenton said. “If I had just read it at first blush, and I didn’t know the whole story, it would knock my hat off.

“But knowing the whole story and knowing what’s in my character and in my heart, I know that’s not what it was about,” Osenton said. “I can tell you with 100 percent certainty, attractiveness had nothing to do with any of the hires. There’s not a sexist bone in my body.”

Osenton declined to discuss the investigation's findings related to the gender divisions in his staff.

Osenton said City Manager Russ Blackburn let him know the council wanted him gone.

“Council asked me to resign,” Osenton said. "The contact went through the city manager, who was asking on behalf of the City Council. I don’t really want to go into the specific conversations I had with anybody.”

Blackburn, however, disputed that assertion: "No one asked for Mr. Osenton's resignation."

Osenton said he was looking for a new job, but declined to disclose his prospects.

Unreported problems

Vice Mayor Shannon Martin — who with Oravec is a holdover from the council that hired Osenton in July 2016 — also blamed Osenton for allowing staff relations in the City Attorney's Office to deteriorate.

“I think it’s unfortunate that there was so much mismanagement going on,” Martin said. “It was up to Reggie, really, as the leader of that department to notify the council, his bosses, of things going on. And obviously, he didn’t do that for his own reasons."

“Maybe he thought he could handle it. Maybe he thought he was handling it. I don’t know,” Martin said. “I really can’t answer as to why he didn’t deal with it.”

Councilman John Carvelli also said the problems in the City Attorney's Office were not apparent to him.

“I don’t know how it happened on our watch, but when we found out there was a complaint, action was taken,” Carvelli said. “We rely on people to run the departments on day-to-day operations.”

Councilwomen Jolien Caraballo and Stephanie Morgan did not respond to questions about the council's accountability for Osenton's failings and the deterioration of staff relations in the City Attorney's Office.

Port St. Lucie Mayor Greg Oravec delivers his State of the City address Feb. 26, 2018.(Photo: GEORGE ANDREASSI/TCPALM)

It was Oravec who triggered the first downward spiral of the City Attorney's Office in February 2014, when he blew the whistle on suspected Sunshine Law violations by three City Council members.

Longtime City Attorney Roger Orr resigned in April 2014 after a State Attorney's Office investigation found he acted as an intermediary in private council talks about whether to offer Oravec a severance package to resign as city manager.

Pam Booker

That June, the council promoted longtime Assistant City Attorney Pam Booker to the city attorney job.

Oravec was elected mayor in November 2014 and Martin won a second four-year term.

Predecessor fired

The Oravec-led council fired Booker in February 2016 for poor communications and for providing bad legal advice.

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